Nijntje op de fiets langs trein en zebrapad

What does “zebrapad” mean in Dutch?

Zebrapad puts two Dutch words together: zebra (the animal, for its stripes) and pad (path). The result is the everyday word for a pedestrian crossing — the striped road marking where you stop to let people cross. Once you know that pad means path, a whole family of Dutch compounds opens up: fietspad (cycle path), voetpad (footpath), bospad (forest path). One word, two lessons at once.

In the clip, the narrator builds up the reveal: “Wat is dat? Heel veel lijnen. Weet jij het al? Nu zie ik het. Het is een zebrapad.” — “What is that? Lots of lines. Do you know yet? Now I see it. It’s a zebrapad.” Miffy (Nijntje) stops at the curb and models the correct road-safety sequence: look left, look right, look left again. The word then comes back in the summary (“een trein, een auto en een zebrapad”), cementing it perfectly. In everyday Dutch you cross op het zebrapad and cars must give way bij het zebrapad — the crossing doubles as a right-of-way marker, not just a visual stripe.